Your gateway to Oklahoma information ...

About the Oklahoma Digital Prairie Collections

The Oklahoma Digital Prairie is a service of the Oklahoma Department of Libraries and other Oklahoma state agencies with which it partners. Included in Digital Prairie services are repositories of state government information, research databases and special online topical exhibits.

Some collections emphasize content that vividly reflect Oklahoma's rich history, spanning more than 100 years and ranging in date from the late 1800s to the present day. Others, such as the recently added Documents.Ok.Gov and Forms.Ok.Gov emphasize the public's right to access government information and forms that affect the citizen's daily life.

Content

Content presented in the Collections is gathered from a variety of sources.

Content in Documents.Ok.Gov and Forms.Ok.Gov is gathered from two main sources: the Oklahoma Publications Clearinghouse and file submissions received from Oklahoma state government agencies.

Content in the remaining collections is mainly obtained from digitizing materials in the archives and documents divisions of the Department of Libraries. Careful consideration has gone into the selection of each and every item for these latter collections. The criteria for selection were particularly focused on a) materials difficult to access due to their rarity, b) materials with broad interdisciplinary application, and c) materials that are at a risk from a preservation point of view.

Viewing Tools

The Digital Prairie Collections utilize the CONTENTdm digital collection management software to organize and present content. CONTENTdm allows for the virtual recreation of hierarchical materials online, making it possible to read through a book or a series of letters on screen as you would with the physical copy in hand. Another key feature of CONTENTdm's Docment Viewer is its ability to display page images and full-text transcripts side by side; this vastly simplifies the process of reading 19th-century penmanship while still allowing the reader to appreciate the style and format of the original writing. Full-text searching capabilities of materials with accompanying transcripts is provided. CONTENTdm has been optimized for use in all major browsers.